Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
Once in a Moscow chess club I saw how two first-category players knocked pieces off the board as they were exchanged, so that the pieces fell onto the floor. It was as if they were playing skittles and not chess!
Alexander Kotov
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
TAGS & TOPICS
Alexander Kotov
Age: 67 †
Born: 1913
Born: August 12
Died: 1981
Died: January 8
Author
Chess Player
Non-Fiction Writer
Alexander Alexandrovich Kotov
Pieces
Floor
Skittles
Player
Club
Exchanged
Playing
Onto
Moscow
Two
Fell
Knocked
Firsts
Clubs
Category
First
Chess
Board
Players
Categories
Saws
Boards
More quotes by Alexander Kotov
It is better to follow out a plan consistently even if it isn't the best one than to play without a plan at all. The worst thing is to wander about aimlessly.
Alexander Kotov
The placing of the centre pawns determines the topography of a game of chess.
Alexander Kotov
In order to become a grandmaster class player whose understanding of chess is superior to the thousands of ordinary players, you have to develop within yourself a large number of qualities, the qualities of an artistic creator, a calculating practitioner, a cold calm competitor.
Alexander Kotov
When you have finished analyzing all the variations and gone along all the branches of the tree of analysis you must first of all write the move down on your score sheet, before you play it.
Alexander Kotov
My achievements in the field of chess are the result of immense hard work in studying theory.
Alexander Kotov
Once we have chosen the right formation in the centre we have created opportunities for our pieces and laid the foundation of subsequent victory.
Alexander Kotov
You will already have noticed how often Capablanca repeated moves, often returning to positions which he had had before. This is not lack of deciciveness or slowness, but the employment of a basic endgame principle which is 'Do not hurry'.
Alexander Kotov
Experience and the constant analysis of the most varied positions builds up a store of knowledge in a player's mind enabling him often at a glance to assess this or that position.
Alexander Kotov
Here is a definition which correctly reflects the course of thought and action of a grandmaster: - The plan in a game of chess is the sum total of successive strategical operations which are each carried out according to separate ideas arising from the demands of the position.
Alexander Kotov
Time trouble is blunder time.
Alexander Kotov
Bobby Fischer is the greatest Chess genius of all time!
Alexander Kotov
The masters and grandmasters can be divided into three groups - the inveterate time trouble merchants, those who sometimes get into trouble, and those for whom the phenomenon is a very rare occurence.
Alexander Kotov
Drawing general conclusions about your main weaknesses can provide a great stimulus to further growth.
Alexander Kotov
The proponents of Steinitz' theory - Tarrasch and his supporters - tried to express Steinitz' teaching in the form of laconic rules, and as often happens in such cases, they went too far. The laconic tended to become dogmatic, and chess began to lose its freshness, originality and charm.
Alexander Kotov
The study of typical plans is something that the leading grandmasters devote a great deal of time to. I would say that the most far-seeing of them devote as much time to this as to the study of openings.
Alexander Kotov
I cannot think that a player genuinely loving the game can get pleasure just from the number of points scored no matter how impressive the total. I will not speak of myself, but for the masters of the older generation, from whose games we learned, the aesthetic side was the most important. -
Alexander Kotov
After a great deal of discussion in Soviet literature about the correct definition of a combination, it was decided that from the point of view of a methodical approach it was best to settle on this definition - A combination is a forced variation with a sacrifice.
Alexander Kotov
I soon realized that it is not enough for a master simply to analyse variations scrupulously just like an accountant. He must learn to work out which particular moves he should consider and then examine just as many variations as necessary - no more and no less.
Alexander Kotov
Sit there for five hours? Certainly not! A player must walk about between moves, it helps his thinking.
Alexander Kotov
There is no doubt that the reason for my awful oversight was over-confidence that sapped my sense of danger. So that is where to look for the cause of bad blunders - in the exulting feeling of self-congratulation.
Alexander Kotov
